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Jim Carroll

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Anyone fancy a trip to an alternative utopia next weekend? Behold, it’s Inisfox New radio station comingatcha in the capital from August 2009 – Radio Nova gets the nod from the BCI for the classic rock licence in the Dublin …

Jim Carroll

jimcarroll

Tue, Sep 9, 2008, 08:46

Anyone fancy a trip to an alternative utopia next weekend? Behold, it’s Inisfox

New radio station comingatcha in the capital from August 2009 – Radio Novagets the nod from the BCI for the classic rock licence in the Dublin area. Lets hope there are no expensive trips to the High Court for any applicants after this one.

What a fantastic idea. In early October, the In The City music confab takes place in Manchester. Now comes Unconvention, a fringe event aimed at the indie sector timed to co-incide with ITC. We’re sure the late, great Tony Wilson would approve (after, of course, initially cursing them from a height for their audacity to jump on his bandwagon).

Here’s an idea for the Hard Working Class Heroes folks. They should take a leaf out of the playbook of South Africa’s music makers and get Dublin taxi drivers to play CDs by bands taking part in the festival. It would certainly beat Q102 and that “back from your holidays, bud?” opening gambit.

More ideas! Hey, we’re, like, the home of good ideas. We need a venue like The Smell. Straight up, we need an all-ages, no-alcohol sleazy venue like the Los Angeles dive where Health, No Age, the fabulous Mika Miko and our current faves Abe Vigoda cut their teeth and sorted their heads out. Of course, we also need bands are spectacular, inventive and inventive as those four, but that’s another day’s work. Louis Pattison checks it out.

The Mercury Music Prize winner will be announced tonight and naturally, there are some pieces (one here and one there) about the event and the prize ahead of this evening’s big gala. We have a hunch that the judges will give it to Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. Anything to head off the dreaded Led Zep reunion at the pass.

Bill Fuller RIP. One of the most fascinating – and elusive – Irish music business legends of all. Aside from the venues and enterprises mentioned in the Guardian obit, the Kerryman also used to own McGonagles, the Dublin venue some On The Record readers will remember with great fondness. When people go on about hard-chaw Irish music business lads like Dinny Desmond or Vinny Power, they kind of forget about Fuller.

And, here, did ANYONE go to Cois Fharraige at the weekend in Co Clare? Incredible lack of buzz or comment about this (heavily sponsored and branded) event. Did it actually exist or did we just dream it? Was it full of lads in woolly jumpers trying to recreate the Denny’s Sausages ad from the TV? Do we give it the “meh” fest of the summer award and be done with it?